


And Peace on Earth

by queenofchildren



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Roommates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-30
Updated: 2016-01-08
Packaged: 2018-05-10 11:31:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5584192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofchildren/pseuds/queenofchildren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke is preparing for a quiet, lonely Christmas Eve, and the one good thing about it is that her obnoxious roommate won't be here to ruin it. Except then the power goes out, Bellamy comes back, a truce is declared and Christmas turns out very differently than she expected.</p><p>Now with Part II: New Year's Eve!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. And Peace on Earth

“ _Have yourself a merry little Christmas…“_

Frank Sinatra is crooning softly through the steamed-up bathroom, there are candles flickering on the windowsill and Clarke is soaking in a gigantic tub filled with a vaguely Christmas-scented bubble-bath (cinnamon maybe). It should be a perfect afternoon, and yet Clarke is feeling less than festive. It’s the afternoon before Christmas Eve, a time Clarke normally spends packing presents and basking in excitement for her favourite holiday, which she was determined to enjoy the hell out of after last year’s Christmas was overshadowed by heartbreak.

 _Vorfreude_ , Wells told her once, that’s the German word for the feeling that usually manages to carry Clarke all through December: The pleasant state of having something nice to look forward to and entertaining oneself by imagining the joyful experiences to come.

Unfortunately, all of her lovely _Vorfreude_ -spirit has dissipated over the past week, and now Clarke is seriously considering just never getting out of that tub again. Not only won’t she be seeing any of her friends this Christmas because they somehow all have other plans, but not even her mom can make it here in time to celebrate with her, even though she promised. It’s been two months since Clarke moved to this city, and even though she has Raven, Clarke still feels a little lonely sometimes. She spends too much time at the hospital to make much of an effort to meet new people, and the other interns aren’t exactly volunteering to befriend her since Murphy told everyone that her mom is friends with the Chief of Surgery and put in a good word for her to get the coveted intern position. (Which isn’t even true.)

And then there’s her roommate.

Clarke is endlessly grateful to Raven for letting her stay in her room while she’s looking for a place of her own, and she has to admit the small but cozy apartment is really lovely – if it weren’t for the person she has to share it with, one rude, grumpy, irritatingly attractive Bellamy Blake.

Whenever Raven has mentioned her roommate to her before, her usually so snarky best friend sounded uncharacteristically affectionate; to the point where Clarke was wondering if she had competition for the position of Raven’s best friend. Mostly, however, she was happy Raven had found someone great to live with, and had figured that if Raven liked him so much, the guy couldn’t be a bad roommate. She had promptly moved in without having ever met Bellamy before – and had regretted it about a day in.

For some unknown reason, Bellamy seems to hate her, and he’s not shy about letting her know it: He’s constantly needling her about forgetting to take out the trash, about watching TV too loud when he’s preparing the next day’s lessons and needs quiet, about using too much water on her (admittedly rather frequent) long baths. She tried to appease him for about a week, to be extra-nice and quiet and helpful around the apartment, but when that had no effect at all, she decided to fire back. They’ve been sniping and bickering at each other practically non-stop since then, and the one silver lining to this failure of a Christmas is that Bellamy left this afternoon to visit his sister Octavia and celebrate the holiday with her and her boyfriend.

And just when she’s decided to make good use Bellamy’s absence and have a long, guilt-free bath followed by a quiet Christmas at home, maybe watch a movie and eat the packet of expensive double-choc ice-cream she bought earlier, the light goes out, leaving her in dusky near-darkness except for the flickering candles.

Not knowing what else to do, she simply stays put, hoping it was just a fluke and the light will somehow go on again. But it doesn’t, and gradually, the water around her is getting cold and Clarke is getting impatient to find out what’s happening – did the lightbulb just burn out, or is the power out in the entire apartment?  

With a heavy sigh, Clarke climbs out of the bathtub and wraps herself into her towel. She starts groping her way over to the windowsill to fetch one of the candles when she hears it: The unmistakeable sound of the front door opening. But it can’t be…? Clarke freezes mid-step, wondering what would be worse: Someone breaking into the apartment while she’s wearing nothing but a towel, or Bellamy returning when she just thought she was rid of him. Before she can decide, Clarke loses her one-legged balance and quickly sets her foot down again – only for the floor to slide out from under her because she stepped off the bath mat and onto the slippery tiles.

She lands half-on half-off the mat, but the thin bit of cloth doesn’t do much to cushion her fall, and the floor slams into her abruptly, cutting short her startled shriek when all the air is pushed out of of her lungs with an undignified “oomph” and causing pain to radiate all up and down her back. For a few scary moments, she’s struggling to breathe, tears running down into her hair as she tries to calmly assess the state she’s in while her brain only supplies statistics about the number of people who die or are grievously injured due to slipping in the bathroom.

That’s when Bellamy’s voice calls out directly behind the door:

“Clarke? Are you in there?”

She can’t answer because she’s still working on the whole breathing thing, and he sounds pretty worried when he repeats:

“Clarke? Is everything alright? It sounded like someone fell down in there.” And then, to her utter horror, he adds: “Alright, if you don’t say something right now I’m coming in.”

She’s almost managed to croak out a horrified “No!” when the door opens and almost hits her in the head, and then Bellamy is standing above her, looking equal parts worried and confused as he stares down on her winded, dishevelled, towel-clad form. Oh God, the towel! Sliding her hands down from where it’s luckily still tied tightly across her breasts, she finds that the front seam of her towel-toga has split open in her fall, revealing much, much more than she ever wanted to show Bellamy, of all people. She lets out another shriek as she scrambles to cover herself, and only notices then that she’s found her voice again.

“I’m fine. Get out!”

He completey ignores her command to walk around her and kneel down by her side.

“Don’t move until I’ve checked you’re okay. How did this even happen? And why is the entire apartment dark? Is this your idea of a romantic setting?”

“No. It’s this crappy apartment’s idea of a festive blackout.” She grinds out through gritted teeth, feeling a little bad when he looks offended at her calling the apartment “crappy”. “This happened because the lights went out, and when I wanted to go investigate, _someone_ barged in and startled me, and that’s when I slipped and fell. I’m pretty sure I’m okay though – I can feel my arms and legs,” she wriggles them to prove it, “so we can rule out a spinal injury,” she rolls her head carefully, feeling already calmed by her clinical self-assessment (and maybe a little bit by the fact that if she does turn out to be injured, at least she’s not alone), “and it seems my neck is okay too. You can help me up now.”

He looks startled for a moment and she really hopes he won’t take offense at being ordered about. But he just silently snakes an arm around her shoulders and one under her knees and slowly and carefully gets to his feet. He’s swaying for a moment and grunting with the effort, but Clarke is nonetheless impressed – she’s not exactly wispy, and living on Christmas cookies and other winter delights for the last month sure as hell didn’t help. And yet here she is, being carried out of the bathroom, bridal style, like it’s no big deal, and for a second Clarke forgets who exactly is doing the carrying and lets herself get distracted by the feeling of Bellamy’s arms under her, muscles taut with the strain of holding her, his cable-knit sweater warm against her damp, rapidly-cooling skin. The position brings her closer to him than she’s ever been before, and when she inconspicuously studies him from under her lashes, she discovers that he has even more freckles than she thought, that there’s a faint, crescent-shaped scar on his cheek and that his jawline (which she may or may not have been itching to draw for practice) could indeed cut glass.

She’s torn out of her thoughts when he reaches the sofa and stops, and for a moment, she’s afraid he’ll just dump her on it. But he lowers her down, slowly and carefully, and then immediately covers her bare legs with a blanket and sits down next to her on the sofa, studying her intently.

“So your back is fine? No pain? Nausea?”

She shakes her head. It’s still throbbing a little, and there may be bruising later on the points that bore the brunt of the impact, like her tailbone and shoulder blades, but otherwise, she feels as good as can be expected.

Bellamy still looks worried though. “What about your head?”

She shakes the body part in question, relieved when the movement is not followed up by pain, and then remembers her head landing on something soft. “I think my fluffy slippers cushioned the blow.”

“Good.”

For a moment he just stands there awkwardly, looking like he wants to do something but not sure what, and the rather unhelpful thought enters her head that he’s actually quite cute like this.  

Then she moves, trying to get a little more comfortable, and this time the towel almost comes apart at the top. Which should be embarrassing for her, but oddly, it’s Bellamy who blushes wildly and looks away – but not, she notices with an unexpected spark of triumph, before briefly letting his eyes linger where the towel just barely clings to the top of her breasts.

There’s no denying it, she enjoys watching him squirm and it only increases when she says innocently:

“Oops. Perhaps I should put some clothes on.”

“Perhaps you should.” Bellamy sounds oddly strangled, Clarke notes with interest. He wasn’t this flustered before, even though she was a lot more exposed, but then again, there was a chance that she was injured or paralyzed, so it probably speaks to his character that he didn’t take the time to check her out then. Now, however… well, she wouldn’t be terribly upset if he checked her out a little bit. Only because it makes him blush and stutter, of course, not because she gets a rush of sensual power from the way his dark eyes burn into her.

“Help me up please?” Clarke makes her voice sound just a little more innocent and helpless as she stretches out her arms towards him, causing the towel to slip even further down and Bellamy’s cheeks to go from dusky pink to deep scarlet. This is definitely fun.

Unfortunately, at that moment, Bellamy decides to stop playing along. Instead of picking her up again as she had expected, he hooks his hands under her arms and yanks her up, setting her on her feet like a child and thoroughly ruining all attempts at being seductive while refusing to look anywhere but her face.

Iit’s probably for the best, but Clarke still feels a little disappointed as she clutches the front of the towel and strides off to her room. But when she looks back over her shoulder to find him watching her, the triumphant feeling returns. She lets her towel slip off just a split second before she closes the door, and thinks she hears a muffled groan.

When she emerges from her room again, however, Clarke is fully dressed and determined to stop teasing him. She’s a grown-up after all, and he’s the guy who’s contributed to make her life hell the past months. He deserves to be teased, yes, but he does not deserve to see her best assets.

Even if he does look cute when he blushes.

Or, she notes and swallows hard, when he’s stretching up to reach their unreasonably high fuse box, his rolled-up sleeves revealing corded muscles when he holds up a heavy flashlight and his sweater riding up to show just a tiny sliver of golden skin.

This time, it’s Clarke’s turn to blush, but luckily, he’s distracted with the fuse box.

“Yep, it’s a blackout. At least none of the fuses blew. As soon as the power’s back, the lights should go on again.”

Clarke nods and then goes to fetch the candles from the bathroom, as well as every other candle she can find, lighting as many of them as necessary to bathe the room in a warm light but leaving some aside for later as she grasps around for something to say.

“What are you even doing here? Shouldn’t you be on your way to your sister’s?”

“My flight got cancelled, so I came back here to propose we call a Christmas truce and celebrate together.”

“A Christmas truce?”

Bellamy closes the fuse box and joins her in distributing the candles across the living-room. As if by some unspoken agreement, neither of them makes any attempts to return to their own rooms.  

“You know, like those soliders in World War I.” That doesn’t really explain anything, but of course Bellamy would try a history reference. Luckily, he expands on the concept: “Until I can get out of here, we bury the hatchet and just try and have a nice evening. Because I love Christmas and I’m not going to let you or the weather take that away from me.”

“ _You_ love Christmas?”

“As a matter of fact, I do.”

“I didn’t know you were capable of feeling that strongly about anything. Except my bathing habits, of course.”

“No one needs to take a bath several times a week!”

His voice is turning strained and sharp already, and Clarke wonders if that means the Christmas truce hasn’t started yet, or if it’s already called off.

“Boy, it’s going to be so much fun celebrating peace and love on earth with you.”

“Sorry. I’ve just been really looking forward to seeing my sister again.”

Despite the apology, his whining sets her on edge. “You’re not the only one who can’t be with family tonight. My mom was supposed to visit, but something came up and she couldn’t make it.”

“Sorry.” This time, he sounds more sincere, and Clarke decides to accept his apology, wondering if they’ve ever actually said sorry to each other about anything before. She guesses no, which means this moment might qualify as a Christmas miracle. Who knows, maybe they will actually manage to make it through one evening without wanting to kill each other.

“Alright, Christmas truce it is. So how do you normally celebrate Christmas?”

For a moment, he seems surprised that she actually accepted the offer, then he grins and walks towards the kitchen area, explaining as he goes:

“Well, Octavia’s boyfriend was going to make roast turkey tonight, and his cooking is so good it makes me almost like him. But since I don’t happen to have a spare turkey lying around, we’ll just have to see what’s in the freezer. If the electricity stays off, we’ll have to either eat or throw away everything in there anyway. Might as well make a feast of it.”

He opens the built-in freezer compartment of the fridge and starts taking out a rather random assortment of things, starting with her sinfully expensive Christmas ice-cream.

“Looks like our entrée will be ice-cream.”

“And our main course too, or how do you suggest we cook the food without electricity?”

He looks dismayed for a moment as Clarke mentions this flaw in his plan, but then his face brightens as he strides over to the small, overstuffed storage cupboard in the hallway. After a bit of rummaging around, he emerges triumphantly with a black plastic case which he sets on the table.

“Who knew Octavia’s obsession with the great outdoors would ever save someone’s Christmas Eve?”

He opens the plastic case to reveal a camping stove, complete with a full gas cartridge.

“Well then, what would you like for your first course?”

They spend the next hour trying out how to best combine the wide range of foods they unearth from the freezer to come up with something edible, and Clarke finds to her astonishment that she’s actually having fun. Keeping his promise of a truce, Bellamy doesn’t snipe at her once, just gently instructs her on how to prepare the various foods. Clarke isn’t exactly a master chef, whereas Bellamy often conjures up creations that make her mouth water, so she leaves it up to his expertise to somehow scrape together a meal, and Bellamy actually steps up to the challenge and delivers.

They’re almost done with the curly fries when, out of nowhere, he says: “I’m sorry I was such an ass to you.” Clarke freezes with a fry halfway to her mouth and listens incredulously as he continues: “It’s just… Raven’s one of my best friends, and she’s awesome, so naturally people take advantage of her. When you came here, moving into her room like you owned the place, I thought you were one of those people.”

Clarke doesn’t know whether she should be insulted that he thought she was taking advantage of her best friend or touched that he’s looking out for Raven.

“Raven _insisted_ I take her room – I only asked if I could stay on your couch for a few days until I could find some other solution, but she said I should just move into her room and take my time looking for my own place. I think her and Wick are using the opportunity to do a test run before they actually move in together. And for the record, I’m paying Raven’s full rent and a little extra on the water bill.”

“Oh. Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“Because you were so quick to assume I’d be a wasteful freeloader, I didn’t feel like proving myself to you.”

He winces. “Sorry about that. I don’t know, I guess being hypersensitive about money is one of my bad habits.” Looking up, he notices her inquiring expression. “We didn’t have a lot when we grew up. In fact, we barely scraped by, and my mother had to turn over every penny three times. It just gets to me when people are wasteful, I guess.”

“I’m sorry. I’m really not wasteful, normally – I try to save electricity and everything. It’s just…. for the past two months, that bathtub and Raven were the only good things about this city. Everything else sucks.”

“Like what?”

She gives him a quick recap of the whole “almost no friends plus asshole colleagues”-situation, and by the time she’s done, he looks sympathetic and more than a little contrite.

“I didn’t know you were having such a hard time. And then on top of all that, I was hounding you about stupid shit…”

She waves her hand magnanimously and refills both their glasses, which she considers a conciliatory gesture.

“Don’t worry about it. I think it’s safe to say I gave as good as I got.”

“That you did.” He nods solemnly and clinks his refilled glass against hers, and for a moment they both drink in silence before something else occurs to Clarke.

“Why do you hate your sister’s boyfriend? Is he really that terrible or are you just an overbearing dick?”

“Ouch. Please, don’t pull your punches on account of my feelings, Princess.” His grin tells her he’s not really hurt though, and for the first time, the nickname doesn’t sound like an insult. “He’s okay, really, but he’s the reason my sister moved across the country, so, you know, I have to hate him a little bit on principle. Plus, I’m pretty sure he’s going to propose to her this Christmas, which means my baby sister will get married before me and will officially be better at this whole adulting thing than I am.”

Clarke laughs and pats his hand patronisingly. “Don’t worry, you’ll catch up.”

But her levity doesn’t quite catch on, as Bellamy still looks a little forlorn.

“It’s just weird to see her so grown up, you know? She’s always been my responsibility, I basically raised her because our mom was always working and now…” Clarke is simultaneously marvelling at how much of himself he reveals and vowing to hit him over the head if he says that his sister is some other man’s responsibility now, but he surprises her: “now she’s fending for herself, and doing a pretty good job too. It’s weird that she doesn’t need me anymore.”

Clarke isn’t entirely sure what to say to that, since she doesn’t have siblings. But of course, she can relate to feeling responsible for someone else’s well-being, seeing as that’s exactly what she’s responsible for at the hospital all the time. So this is what she draws from when she tries to cheer him up.

“Look at it this way: That just means you did a damn good job raising her.”

He looks surprised for a moment, before a smile blooms across his face that takes her breath away for a moment.

“You’re right. I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me. I shouldn’t be so morose.”

“Eh, Christmas has that effect sometimes.” And doesn’t she know it, Clarke thinks as she recalls the sobfest that was last Christmas. Thankfully, she’s left that behind now. Still, she thinks it’s best to leave the treacherous emotional territory they’re in and return to some harmless holiday cheer.

“What next – how about some Christmas Carols?”

Bellamy laughs. “I’m a man of many talents,” he shoots her a cocky wink at the words, “but singing is not one of them. How about a Christmas movie instead? My laptop’s fully charged.”

“Which one?”

“Your choice. But I get a veto.”

Clarke doesn’t even have to think about her choice: “ _The Holiday._ ”

Bellamy tilts his head and studies her, considering her answer. “Interesting choice – I would have pegged you for more of a _Love Actually_ kind of girl.”

“It’s kind of overrated, I think.”

Bellamy either agrees or doesn’t care, because he pulls up the movie and sets the laptop on the table, adjusting it so they can both see the screen well, and peaceful silence settles over them as they sip rich red wine and watch as Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz get their hearts broken.

It may be the wine or the lingering moroseness from earlier in the day, but by the time the movie nears its happily ever afters, Clarke is feeling rather more emotional than she’d like to be in Bellamy’s presence.  

“ _I understand feeling as small and as insignificant as humanly possible.”_ Clarke actually quotes the words along, one of her favourite lines, and then tries to hide the fact that she’s crying all the way through Kate Winslet’s monologue about the devastating effects of unrequited love. (Which reminds her just a little bit too much of the fact that she spent last Christmas pining after a woman who chose someone else over her.)

She fails spectacularly at hiding her blubbering, until Bellamy eventually pauses the movie to look at her with a very concerned expression.

“I thought we said we were going to have a nice Christmas Eve.”

“We are.”

“Then why are you crying?”

“Because I get it, okay? I just get it _so much_ , feeling as insignificant as humanly possible.”

He continues to study her intensely. “You shouldn’t. You shouldn’t even know what that feels like.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re a leading lady. Did you even _watch_ the movie? It’s like the whole point of her storyline.”

Clarke laughs tearfully, and then, on a whim, she leans over and kisses him on the cheek.

“Thank you.”

She intends for it to mean nothing more than that, but when she draws back, he sort of sways in her direction as if drawn to follow her by an invisible string, and then he’s leaning closer and she’s not backing away, partly because the armrest behind her is stopping her and partly because she doesn’t want to. This is not the same Bellamy she said goodbye to this afternoon and meant  _good riddance_ , this is a guy who chivalrously carried her to safety after her accident, who threw her an impromptu feast and cheered her up when she expected to have a miserably lonely Christmas Eve, and she wants to know more about this guy. She wants him to stay and she wants him closer, and so she leans towards him and kisses him again, on the lips this time, and he kisses her back as if he’d been waiting for this for ages.

His lips are softer than his usually so sharp tongue suggests; his hands when they settle on her arms to pull her closer gentle like they were before when he picked her up, and he tastes like wine and chocolate and feels like home, somehow.

It doesn’t take long before all thoughts of unrequited love have fled her mind, along with most other coherent thoughts, and the only thing she’s aware of is Bellamy, whose kisses are growing ever more urgent and demanding while his hands slide down her arms and around to the small of her back, his fingertips slipping under the hem of her shirt to ghost across her skin and leave goosebumps in their wake. Clarke in turn presses closer to him and sucks on his bottom lip, prompting him to inhale sharply and shiver under her hands, and she suddenly has the strong urge to climb into his lap and just rub herself all over him. She’s in the process of doing exactly that when the lights go on again, momentarily blinding them both.

Bellamy blinks a few times to get used to the bright light, then he looks at her like a deer in the headlights, and Clarke guesses she looks much the same. Except, it occurs to her, _she’s_ the one who started this, and who was in the process of practically grinding on him before the lights made her freeze, and suddenly she’s mortified – what if he never intended for it to go this far?

Pulling down her sweater, she scrambles off him as quickly as she can and retreats to the opposite corner of the couch, looking at anything but him and trying to sound breezy and unaffected when she says:

“This doesn’t have to be a big deal, you know. We can just blame it on the wine and pretend it never happened.”

He’s silent for an unnervingly long time while Clarke studies the little elves and reindeer on her fluffy Christmas socks as if she’d never seen them before.

“We could do that. But I don’t think it’s a good idea to lie on Christmas Eve, of all times.”

She’s about to ask what the hell he means by that when he supplies the explanation himself.

“It wasn’t the wine, not for me. The towel may have had something to do with it,” Clarke blushes again, remembering her involuntary striptease in the bathroom, “but the truth is, I’ve had a crush on you since the day you moved in.”

That makes her head snap up and her eyes shoot back to his, waiting to find a smirk on his face that tells her he’s only making fun of her.

He isn’t, she can tell the second she takes in his painfully earnest expression, and honestly, this is just all a bit much. The hysterical tone returns to her voice with a vengeance.

“Then why were you such an ass to me?”

“Because like I said, I didn’t know if you were okay or if you were taking advantage of Raven. And I hoped if you hated me, it would go away.”

He looks embarrassed, so at least he’s aware of how stupid this is.

“And did it work?”

“No. It got worse and I felt bad for being an ass. But by that point, it was kind of too late to stop.”

Clarke shakes her head in stunned disbelief, and he takes it as his cue to defend himself:

“It’s just common sense, really. Having a crush on someone you live with is a terrible idea. It’s the first rule of living with roommates – ‘don’t hit on, sleep with, or otherwise get emotionally entangled with people you’re forced to see on a daily basis even if things don’t work out.'”

“The _first_ rule?”

He nods solemnly. “Even before 'Do your own dishes.'”

“Speaking from experience?” She’s trying to be subtle, but his smirk tells her he saw right through it.

“You mean were Raven and I ever a thing? No.” Clarke hates to admit it to herself, but she’s relieved to hear it. Unfortunately, he’s not done talking yet. “We did have sex though. Once, right after Raven broke up with Finn. She was feeling like shit, there was alcohol involved… Things happened. But it didn’t really complicate anything – we both know we’re better off as friends.”

Clarke nods, feeling a little thunderstruck and more disappointed than she altogether understands.

“But the fact that Raven and I had sex is part of why I didn’t want to do anything about my feelings for you – I’d hate to make things weird between the two of you, even though Raven said it wouldn’t be a problem.”

“You talked to _Raven_ about this?” This conversation is just getting stranger and stranger.

“I called her on the way back from the airport to ask if I could crash at Wick’s place while they’re gone visiting his parents. She told me to, I quote, “stop being a baby and just go home and clear the air with Clarke”. She also told me that she expects us to be at least friendly after the holidays, so please don’t go back to hating me.”

“I won’t. Apparently, you being nice gets me food.”

He laughs, but he still looks a little wary. “So we’re good?”

Are they? They could be good, or at the very least friendly. Tonight has proven that. But they could also be… more than good. “I’m not sure. I mean, that was a lot to take in… I’m not quite sure what to do now.”

“You don’t have to do anything. I get it, I kind of sprung this on you. How about we just go back to our regularly scheduled Christmas programming, and you take as much time as you need to decide what you think?”

Clarke nods, slowly. It sounds like a good plan, and definitely more sensible than what they were well on their way to doing before the lights went back on. But a part of her still can’t help but imagine what it would have been like to take off his clothes and rain kisses down that perfectly sculpted chest, to get rid of her own roomy sweatpants and straddle him once more with nothing between them… She swallows hard and pushes the thought aside. First rule of roommates, and all.

Apparently, Clarke has been silent and distracted for too long, because Bellamy is starting to look a little panicked.

“And I promise, whatever you do, it’s fine. If you want to continue this,” he makes a sweeping gesture that encompasses both of them as well as the sofa and that Clarke interprets as a reference to what they just did here, “and see where it goes, I’m in. If you want to be nothing more than very mature and polite roommates, I’ll do my best. If you want to go back to bickering about the water bill, that’s okay with me too.”

And with that, he turns back to his laptop to start another Christmas movie, leaving Clarke a moment to get her bearings. The gesture is much appreciated, because Clarke is sure she looks completely dumbstruck right now. The thing is, no one has ever offered her something and made it so clear that it was all up to her, that there were no strings attached to the offer and everything that was going to happen would be her call, without putting any pressure whatsoever on her, and Clarke feels her newly-discovered affection for her roommate increase tenfold just for that.

When he sets down the laptop and leans back against the couch, she snuggles into him, smiling when he puts his arm around her shoulder to pull her closer as the movie starts: _Die Hard_ , a true Christmas classic.

The last coherent thought she’s aware off before drifting off to the sound of John McClane yippie-kay-yaying the bad guys is: This Christmas Eve turned out not so bad after all.

* * *

When Clarke wakes up the next morning, Bellamy is gone – which she should have expected, seeing as he mentioned trying to get another flight out as early as possible. She still feels a little disappointed that he just up and left without a word, which is irrational because he’ll be back in a few days anyway, and it’s not like he owes her anything.

But when she sits up from where she fell asleep on the sofa, bleary-eyed and sluggish and sore, she finds a tin box on the kitchen counter with a note on top.

_Sorry that I left without saying goodbye, but I tried to wake you and you punched me in the nose. In the spirit of the holiday, however, I am willing to overlook that act of hostility. I propose we extend the Christmas truce into the new year, and maybe we can have another impromptu celebration when I get back._

_Merry Christmas, your much reformed roommate._

And just like that, Clarke has a reason to feel _Vorfreude_ again, which only increases when she opens the box to discover a batch of the cookies Bellamy baked a few days ago. The delicious smell made her mouth water, but she was too proud to ask if she could try one. Clearly he noticed, and as she fits this puzzle piece together with all the other little things she learned about him last night, it’s becoming increasingly clear to Clarke that she knows what she’s going to do when he gets back.

 _Merry Christmas_ , Clarke silently tells herself as she bites into one of the cookies and finds that it tastes as divine as it smells.


	2. This Year and the Next

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here's the belated New Year's continuation to my belated Christmas fic because I'm a lazy sloth of a writer. Everything in brackets like this […] is supposed to be phone messages. The super-awkward flirting in this story is an accurate representation of my own non-existent flirting skills.

 

Clarke spends Christmas Day calling her Mom, Wells and Raven, unpacking the gifts they sent or left for her, cleaning up her room, finishing a sketch she's been working on for ages and eating every single one of Bellamy's cookies, each time allowing herself to dwell on her roommate and last night's surprising turn of events only as long as it takes to finish one of the sugary confections.

Just as she simultaneously runs out of cookies and of things to do, her phone lights up with a message from the very roommate in question, and Clarke begrudgingly takes note of the flutter it causes in her stomach. Confusingly, Bellamy's message consists only of a photo of an engagement ring on a slender female hand, followed by a picture of two strangers kissing, before there's finally an explanation:

[He proposed, like I thought. Now this is what I have to put up with all day.]

Clarke actually laughs out loud – she can practically hear Bellamy's exasperation.

[Aww, I think it's romantic. Don't be such a grump about it.]

[If I wanted to be romantic, I would have stayed home.]

And just like that, Clarke's heart beats a little faster. Are they flirting now? This is him flirting, right? She decides to test the waters.

[Really? And what would that have been like?]

[Wouldn't you like to know?]

While she's still trying to come up with an adequately witty answer, Bellamy has already sent another message:

[Forget it Princess, I'm not giving away my secrets. You'll just have to wait and see.]

Yep, they're definitely flirting. And she likes it, Clarke decides as she curls into the corner of the sofa like a very contented cat.

[Is that a promise?]

[Well, I sure hope you didn't interpret it as a threat.]

The message is followed by a breezy winky-emoji, but Clarke sees right through it: He's as nervous as she is and trying to make sure he isn't coming on too strong, that things aren't moving too fast for her. And perhaps they should be, but somehow Clarke isn't freaked out yet. This light banter is just a much more fun variation on their former squabbles – the flirtatious tone might be new, but it's still the same Bellamy behind it.

[Nope, sounds like a promise to me.]

[I'll do my best to live up to it then.]

[You better.]

Clarke's fingers hover over the send-button for several seconds on that last reply. It feels like she's committing to something by allowing the conversation to go in this direction. The question is, is she ready to let it go there? She can't say with absolute certainty that she is, but she does know one thing: She'll always regret it if she doesn't at least try and see where this could go.

She hits send.

*** 

Their back-and-forth continues over the following days, considerably brightening Clarke's mood when she has to return to the hospital two days after Christmas. Not even Murphy's perpetual scowl can ruin the magic of Bellamy's messages, a weird but endearing mixture of calls for help when his sister and her now-fiancé are being too adorable (or, as he calls it, _revolting_ ), jokes that veer dangerously close to Dad-joke-territory, and random snapshots of whatever he deems worthy of sharing with her, which can range from a delicious-looking breakfast to a beautiful piece of street art to a badly misspelled sign that actually makes her giggle out loud in the hospital locker room.

But after several days of this, Clarke finds herself wanting more: She wants another glimpse of the guy who saved her Christmas but is needlessly hostile to people he suspects of wanting to take advantage of his friends. So when he sends her another funny picture, Clarke gathers all her courage and responds:

[Clearly, you have an endless supply of stupid memes. But we have two entire months of near-silence to make up for, and I doubt we'll cover everything with funny pictures alone.]

Of course this is when he decides to take a little longer to reply, and Clarke is left staring at the three blinking dots that indicate he's writing for an agonisingly long time.

When her phone rings, the sudden sound startles her so much she drops it and has to rifle around for it under the sofa.

“So what do you want to know?” Bellamy asks without so much as replying to her breathless "Hello", and Clarke smiles at the eagerness in his voice.

“Everything!”

He laughs but begins to tell her anyway: about the last few days of surviving around a lovey-dovey newly engaged couple, about the hilarious things some of his fifth-graders have written in the essays he's taken with him to grade, about the stupid Christmas traditions he and his sister have kept alive, carried over from their childhood to honour the memory of their mother who died when Bellamy was just 22. Clarke, whose own father died just a few years ago as well, can relate – Christmas is always an emotional time for her, and for the first few years after her father's accident, she and her mother couldn't bear to celebrate it at all.

It is at this point that it dawns on Clarke how much more they have in common than she thought, and finally, there's no stupid water bill to keep them from discovering it. They talk for hours, only winding to a stop when Clarke starts yawning with increasing frequency. She can count the hours of sleep she has left before her alarm rings on one hand, but she still hates the thought of hanging up. It's ridiculous and irrational because in less than a week, he'll be back and they'll have all the time in the world to talk, but she can't help it: now that she has discovered the sweetness under her roommate's prickly exterior, Clarke can't get enough of him.

Bellamy seems to feel similarly.

“I could come home before New Year's Eve, you know. I was supposed to celebrate with Octavia and Lincoln, but I suspect they wouldn't mind the alone time if I ditched them.”

“No, I'm sure they wouldn't.”

“Which means we could have some alone time of our own...”

“I'm listening.”

He laughs, but his voice is serious again when he speaks: “But I want you to know I wasn't kidding when I said there's no pressure, okay? If this is weird for you, just tell me and I'll back off.”

“It's not weird. It's nice, actually.”

“ _Nice_? That's not exactly what I was aiming for in our new-and-improved relationship, you know.”

“What were you aiming for then?” Clarke asks teasingly, determinedly trying not to make a big deal of his use of the word “relationship”. Clearly, he didn't mean it like _that_ , although that doesn't keep her mind from imagining what it would mean if he did.

“Amazing. Breathtaking. Life-changing.”

“Then I guess you'll just have to come home and show me how breathtaking and life-changing you can be.”

“Oh, you can bet on it.”

***

And that is how Clarke suddenly goes from having no plans at all for New Year's Eve to having something to look forward to indeed. Since she's working back-to-back shifts on the days leading up to the big day, their interactions are once again limited to funny pictures from Bellamy and one-emoji-responses from Clarke, but her heart still speeds up every time she thinks about seeing him again.

When the 31st finally comes around, Clarke spends the entire day cleaning every inch of the apartment, imagining Bellamy's return and wondering what to wear for the occasion. Obviously, it's going to have to make his jaw drop. Which, if she's realistic, would definitely be most easily achieved if she just opened the door in nothing but a towel. After all, she still remembers the effect that look had on him last week... But despite their flirty messages, things between them are still very much vague, and since she doesn't want to be presumptuous, Clarke finally just puts on her best pair of jeans and a black sequined top that is definitely sexy but festive enough so as not to be blatantly seductive.

When the time of Bellamy's arrival finally rolls around and she opens the door, Clarke is glad she opted against the towel or any variations on the theme.

Bellamy is standing outside alright, and looking very happy to see her, but instead of greeting her with a breathless _“Hi Princess_ ” like she imagined, he only blurts out: “I'm sorry” before he's cut off by a chorus of other voices hollering:

“Surprise!”

Behind Bellamy, what looks like everyone she knows has squeezed into the hallway outside their apartment to yell at her at the top of her lungs: Raven and Wick are there, Monty and Jasper, even Wells and Harper who must have flown in from home and Bellamy's friend Miller who looks like he's not entirely sure what he's doing here, as well as a tall, muscular guy who looks vaguely familiar but whom Clarke can't place for the life of her.

Clarke is still trying to figure out what the hell is happening and why she's only _looking_ at Bellamy and not throwing herself into his arms when Raven jumps her instead, hugging her tightly and whispering into her ear:

“You won't believe how happy I was to have an excuse to come back here. I don't think Wick's parents like me very much.”

That does not explain anything, Clarke thinks, but Raven is already holding her back at arms' length to inspect her outfit and very carefully done make-up.

“Why are you all dressed-up? Don't tell me you knew about the party?”

Clarke shakes her head dumbly, but before she can come up with some excuse about planning to go out for drinks with her colleagues or something, a voice somewhere behind Raven pipes up accusingly:

“Bellamy spilled the beans, didn't he? I knew it, he was always crap at keeping secrets.”

Clarke isn't so sure about that herself – Bellamy managed just fine to keep a very big secret from her for two entire months. But she doesn't say so because the person belonging to the voice is pushing towards her from behind Tall Muscular Guy, and Clarke immediately realizes she's looking at Bellamy's sister Octavia. She's seen her in photos around the apartment and Raven has occasionally tagged her in pictures on facebook, and although Clarke has never met her personally, she knows how important Bellamy's little sister is to him. If they were a couple, this would be the big meeting-the-family-moment, and Clarke can't help but feel a little nervous as the younger woman plants herself fully in front of her and looks her up and down.

“So you're Clarke. I've heard _a lot_ about you.” The way she stresses the words “a lot” causes Bellamy to blush and a warm feeling to spread inside Clarke's chest. When the other woman pulls her into a hug, Clarke's eyes search out Bellamy's face to find him looking relieved – she was right, Clarke realizes: She is in fact meeting the family. Right now, without any preparation. Without even knowing what she's meeting them _as_...

Clarke tamps down on a flash of panic as Octavia lets go of her and explains:

“Bellamy told us you had to celebrate Christmas alone, and since he felt very bad about that, we decided to come join you for New Year's. I hope you don't mind.”

Wondering who exactly made that decision, and how it somehow got communicated to all of her friends, Clarke has the presence of mind to smile and shake her head.

“Of course not. It was very sweet of you guys to think of me.” And then finally remembering that, technically, she's the hostess here, she opens the door wide and steps inside. “Come on in!”

Within the next hour, the quiet apartment is undergoing a very thorough transformation: Furniture is being pushed aside in the living-room, food prepared in the kitchen area, Raven and Wick are setting up Raven's expensive stereo to blast music at an ear-shattering volume, and Miller is in the process of opening a keg. When Clarke manages to catch Bellamy's eyes above the chaos, he smiles apologetically and mouths “Sorry”, but then Miller enlists his help with the keg and Clarke is pulled into the kitchen by Octavia, who manages to simultaneously prepare three different dishes of food, instructed by her fiancé Tall Muscular Guy (whose name is Lincoln, Clarke finally remembers) and interrogate Clarke about her intentions.

“So you and Bell have been living together for what, two months now? How's that working out?”

“We had some initial difficulties, but now we get along great.”

Octavia nods. “Glad to hear it. My brother can be a bit of an ass, but he means well.”

Clarke hums in a vaguely affirmative way and pretends to be completely focused on arranging a plate of cheese and crackers while Octavia makes more inquiries disguised as chitchat. It's a bit unnerving, but it also means that Octavia must have somehow caught on to the fact that Bellamy cares about her and wants to make sure he won't get hurt, and she respects that – she's been similarly protective of Wells and Raven when they got into new relationships. Still, she thinks, she's going to have to put a stop to this before Octavia's questions get anymore direct and she'll no longer be able to evade them. Luckily, it's not hard to think of something that should distract the other woman.

“Congratulations by the way – Bellamy told me you guys got engaged over the holidays.”

Just as Clarke hoped, this prompts Octavia to drop all inquiries into the nature of her and Bellamy's relationship to launch into a detailed account of the very romantic proposal. By the time the story includes a puppy, two dozen roses and artificial snow, she finally understands Bellamy's increasing exasperation with his lovesick sister. Looking over at Octavia's fiancé, Clarke finds it hard to imagine him putting on this kind of a show – he seems more like the strong silent type. Octavia must have guessed her train of thought.

“Of course, Lincoln actually proposed to me a few days earlier, very quietly and beautifully. But I asked him to do it again just to mess with Bell, and then we figured we might as well go all out.”

Clarke only gapes at the other woman as the words sink in, before she finally understands and laughs out loud. Clearly, she's not the only one who enjoys winding up Bellamy.

“I hope he didn't suffer too much.” Octavia's apologetic tone is belied by the fact that she does not look sorry in the least.

Clarke shoots a look over to the dining table in the living-room where Bellamy and Miller are now in the process of thoroughly taste-testing the beer. Bellamy did send a few desperate rants about people not respecting his boundaries and “acting like a goddamn Disney princess”, but she still got the feeling he was happy for his sister.

“Nah, he'll be fine. He just wants you to be happy.”

“Good.” Octavia follows Clarke's gaze over at Bellamy. “Because I just want him to be happy too.”

There is definitely a warning note in her voice now, and Clarke has to force herself not to shrink back from Octavia's steely gaze. But then Bellamy looks at them, no doubt alerted by the fact that they have both been straight-up staring at and talking about him, and when his eyes meet Clarke's, he smiles brightly, causing her to blush but smile right back. When she finally manages to tear her eyes off him and look back at her conversation partner, Octavia's features have softened again.

“But you're right – it looks like he'll be fine.”

Clarke is saved from Octavia's well-intentioned but still somewhat unsettling attention when Raven calls her over and asks her to look for a box of party decorations stashed somewhere in her room, and Clarke is only too glad to escape the crowded living-room for a moment to herself.

Of course, she doesn't actually get it. Clarke has just climbed on a chair to start looking for the box on top of Raven's closet when she hears the door open again behind her. Biting down on an irritated “what now?” Clarke turns around, only to find herself unexpectedly facing a nervous-looking Bellamy.

He steps inside the room, quickly closing the door behind him, and Clarke tries to ignore the way her heart speeds up at being suddenly alone with him.

“I'm so sorry about springing this party on you! I wanted to warn you, but O said it would be much better as a surprise.”

Clarke starts scrambling down from the chair and Bellamy quickly walks over to offer her a hand. It's a very chivalrous gesture, with the added bonus of giving Clarke an opportunity to put her hands on his chest under the guise of steadying herself. She ends up excitingly close to him when her feet find the ground, and whatever she wanted to say – something about it being a nice surprise maybe? - flies right out of her head when she sways briefly and Bellamy grips her waist to steady her, leaving them in an almost-embrace that makes her stomach flutter nervously.

Thankfully, he doesn't seem to mind her silence as he too remains silent for a long moment, wordlessly studying her before he smiles and says softly:

“Hey roommate.”

“Hey.” It's not quite the seductive welcome she had in mind, and Clarke winces at how decidedly un-witty she sounds.

“I've missed you.” She should be used to his particular brand of courageous honesty by now, but the admission still catches her unaware and leaves her reeling. Masking her sudden jitteriness behind a smile, she teases:

“You've been gone for a _week_.”

“Yes, well, it was a week I wanted to spend with you.”

And God, if she thought his messages had made her happy, these words, this moment with him in her room, smiling as he tightens his hands around her waist and pulls her closer, is threatening to make her heart burst with happiness. And since she's clearly not as good with words as he is, Clarke decides to forgo speaking entirely and just kisses him. She had fun messaging back and forth with him, she loved talking to him on the phone and she felt a happy flutter upon seeing him, and now all she needs to find out is if she still likes kissing him as much as she did the first time it happened.

The answer, it turns out pretty quickly, is a resounding _Yes_! She likes everything about kissing Bellamy – the feeling of his firm, broad chest under her hands, his happy little sigh when she slides them up into his hair, the gentle friction of his lips against hers and the teasing strokes of his tongue when she opens her mouth: Everything about it is exactly as perfect as she had hoped it would be, and Clarke is so relieved she breaks away from him to lean her head against his chest.

“Oh thank God!” The words escape her involuntarily, and Clarke hides her face in Bellamy's shirt in embarrassment, but he has already heard.

“It's Bellamy, actually...”

Clarke rolls her eyes because as much as she likes his silly humour, there are limits to how much dorkiness she can find attractive, even on Bellamy. (Although admittedly it would take _a lot_ to make him unattractive.)

“Don't make me regret making out with you.”

“Fine. Will you tell me what you're so thankful about then?”

She can't bring herself to look at him when she mumbles out her explanation. “I was afraid that Christmas Eve was a fluke. That it really was just the wine or the loneliness, and that I've been building up this moment in my head all week only to be disappointed tonight.”

“So you've thought about this a lot, have you?” Clarke pushes aside her embarrassment to glare at him, and Bellamy quickly lifts his hand in a gesture of surrender. “Hey, I've been thinking about it too, okay? And with good reason - it wasn't a fluke, was it?”

“No, it wasn't.”

“Thank God indeed.”

This time it's Bellamy who kisses her, and she notes with satisfaction that he's just as eager about it as she was.

She's not entirely sure how it happens, but within a scarily short amount of time, Clarke is backed up against the closet with Bellamy pressed against her, making her dizzy with his languid, drugging kisses while his hands follow her every curve and proceed to drive her mad in the most delicious way.

Remembering where they are and what they _should_ be doing instead of this and pulling away from him may be the hardest thing Clarke has ever done.

“We should get back out there. This is our party, people will be wondering where we are.”

“Let them wonder. We have a perfectly good explanation.”

“Which is?”

“I've been waiting all week to do this,” he kisses her cheek, “and this,” his lips slide down to her jaw, “and this...” he finds the sensitive spot just below the edge of her jaw and presses an open-mouthed kiss there that makes her gasp and buck her hips against his.

“That's a pretty good explanation...”

“I have more explanations, if you want to hear them...”

Oh, she definitely does,but she'd rather hear them when all her friends _aren't_ gathered right outside the room. She'll never know where she finds the self-restraint to actually tear herself away from him, but somehow she does.

“Seriously though, I don't want them to notice that something's going on between us.”

Bellamy looks a little hurt now and she hastens to explain: “It's all so new. I want to enjoy this without the others butting in.”

Clarke waits for his reaction with baited breath: after all his talk of not wanting to pressure her, now he can prove he actually meant it.

Bellamy passes her little test with flying colours when he smiles and nods. "Whatever you want, Princess." After a moment's hesitation, he adds: "I still get to kiss you at midnight though, right?”

“Of course you will. Let's start the new year off right.”

He signals his agreement by pressing one more enthusiastic kiss to her lips and then getting up, smoothing down his rumpled shirt and picking up the box of decorations, which is very considerate because not only is the dratted thing quite heavy and terribly dusty, but Clarke also gets an excellent view of his ass when he bends down to pick it up.

Oh yes, Clarke thinks, she'll definitely start the new year off right.

 

 


End file.
